11 Ways To Do What Makes Your Soul Happy
We spend our lives chasing happiness. However, we often end up distracted and looking for it in the wrong places. Corporations convince us to buy things that we don’t need to impress people that we don’t even like. And we work jobs we hate to make money that we think will bring us happiness. However, rather than focusing on pleasing others or collecting material goods, here I will show you how to do what makes your soul happy.
Instead of chasing money and things, what if you learned how to find internal happiness? What if you managed to connect with your inner self and your inner soul and find out what it needs? Take a minute to think about how different your day would be today if you actively decided to only do what makes your soul happy. What would your day look like? How would your inner self feel?
Let’s dive into eleven ways to do what makes your soul happy!
Things That Make Me Happy
To start, grab yourself a piece of paper and a pen (or use the notes on your phone) and make yourself a list titled: “Things that make me happy“. Start writing down anything that makes you happy. Write down things that put a burning passion in your heart, anything that lights a fire in your soul.


Don’t worry about making a neat and organized list. Just write whatever comes to your mind. If you had all the time in the world and you could do what makes your soul happy every day, what would it look like? Write each and every one of those ideas down now!
When you are done writing all of the amazing things that light your soul on fire, keep your list handy. It is time to find ways that you can find happiness and actually do what makes your soul happy. Let your beautiful light shine bright in this incredible life!
How To Do What Makes Your Soul Happy
Remember to think about your “Things that make me happy” list as you review these 11 ways to do what makes your soul happy.
#1. Focus on What Makes You Happy
In order to do what makes your soul happy, you need to focus on what makes you happy. Remember your “Things that make me happy” list? Those are the things that you want to be spending time on each and every day.
Have you ever been stuck in a rut in your life? Actively engaging in the things you are passionate about is one way get yourself unstuck. This means that you can get back to a life of passion and happiness. Find your passion, a job you love, and work that makes you jump out of bed in the morning. If your day is spent doing things that you absolutely love, focusing on what makes you happy will be very easy!


Doing what makes your soul happy is tricky. We are constantly pulled toward material goods and spending money that we end up prioritizing our work. However, we do this so we can have a sense of financial security, which is important for a happy soul.
However, you DO have a choice in the work that you do! And finding a job that you love and makes you want to jump out of bed in the morning with passion is one way to do what makes your soul happy. Being paid to do something that sets your soul on fire is the greatest feeling you can have. In fact, the Japanese believe that finding your ‘ikigai’ (your life passion and life purpose) is the key to a long and happy life.
If you aren’t working a job you love, consider looking for work that uses your passions and strengths. It can be difficult to find the courage to quit your job, but if you find work that lights your soul on fire, it will be a decision you will never regret. Let these ikigai examples inspire you to find your passion and purpose in your work.
#2. Choose Happiness and a Growth Mindset
Another way to do what makes your soul happy is to change your mindset. In simplest terms, your mindset is the way that you choose to see the world and the things that happen to you throughout your day.
People who rely on a fixed mindset tend to see the negative things in their lives as horrible obstacles that do no good. However, people who use a growth mindset see challenges and obstacles as opportunities for growth. The idea of a growth mindset was explored in Carol Dweck’s transformative book Mindset. If you haven’t read it, these 5 key takeaways will completely change the way you live, work, parent, and maintain relationships.
Let’s face it, life is hard! It isn’t very often that we just get to go through life without experiencing any sort of challenge or setback. Choosing to look at these setbacks as opportunities to improve our skills, relationships, and personal traits is a highly effective way to do what makes your soul happy.
When we conquer challenges, we feel happy and proud of ourselves. This reinforces the belief that we can do anything we put our minds to. The feeling of happiness comes from within yourself, so using a mindset that builds up the way you react to negativity will help you keep your soul happy.
Find and revisit your favorite quotes on growth mindset as often as you can. Doing this will keep you inspired to change the way you see challenges and setbacks in your life.
#3. Do What Makes Your Soul Happy By Living a Life Filled With Gratitude
Being grateful for every opportunity, every setback, and every blessing in your life is a key way to do what makes your soul happy. If you are able to see your life as full of abundance, you will feel less desire to fill it with things that do not bring your soul happiness.
Choosing gratitude and happiness comes down to the story that we tell ourselves when we are facing a challenge or an obstacle. This is deeply connected to the way we use a growth mindset to react to negative experiences.


It is very easy to point out the negative in everything. In fact, our brains our wired for it! It is much more difficult to react with gratitude since it doesn’t always come naturally.
However, using this simple word-swap approach will help:
Next time you feel like complaining about something, change your “I really hate when…” statement to a “I am so grateful for…” statement. Take a moment and let your growth mindset find the opportunity in the struggle. Find something to be grateful for in whatever you are complaining about.
For example, my husband hates getting up early. Sometimes our girls will wake him up at 5 am, and man does he complain about it. Instead of saying “I can’t stand when these kids wake me up so early!” he works really hard to say “I am so grateful that I get to spend this time with these beautiful souls”.
It isn’t always easy by any means, but choosing happiness and choosing gratitude will help you do what makes your soul happy.
#4. Do Things that Energize Your Soul
Sometimes it feels like we spend our days doing everything for everyone else. It is easy to forget about ourselves and to take time to take care of ourselves as well.
If you are always doing things for other people, then how will you have have the time to do what makes your soul happy? This isn’t to say that you should be selfish and completely forget about others. However, it is very important that you take time for yourself and do things that energize your soul.
Carving out time for a good self-care routine is one way to prioritize yourself amongst all of the chaos of life. Do the things that you like to do for yourself that energize you! Go for a run, or lift some weights. These are easy things to do that give your body a quick jolt of energy and a sense of accomplishment.


Some people neglect their self-care so much that they become people pleasers. These are the types of people who let others make their decisions for them. People pleasers will give up their own wellness to earn the validation of others.
If you are going to do what makes your soul happy, it is important to stop being a people pleaser. Doing so will make you more confident in your decision making so that you know you are always looking out for your soul’s happiness.
#5. Be Inquisitive and Creative
If you are anything like me, you have inquisitive and creative ideas that come to your mind all the time. However, more often than not, you probably shrug off these thoughts and ideas because you are just too busy to pursue these little urges in your life. Or at least you think you are too busy!
What if instead of shrugging these urges off, you started diving into them. Instead, what would happen if you started setting and working toward goals to connect with and pursue your inquisitive and creative ideas?


When we are young, we are free to play, imagine, and be silly. As we grow up, these pursuits are replaced with responsibilities. It doesn’t have to be so black and white though! Let’s bring back play and creativity!
By letting your creative side run wild you can do what makes your soul happy. You can let yourself try to discover a passion in your life that could lead you down all sorts of amazing roads. Your creative ideas may even give new life to routines in your life that have become dull!
#6. Do What Makes Your Soul Happy By Embracing Your Unique Self
You were uniquely made to be the one and only you on this planet. There are special gifts that you have that are unique to you and only you. You have the right to shine your beautiful light for the rest of the world to see. Don’t strive to be like everyone else. And don’t strive to be complacent in this world. Don’t strive to be the person the rest of the world tells you to be. Be you. The one and only you.
People spend so much of their lives trying to fit in to be like the rest of the world instead of trying to find happiness within themselves. Embracing your unique self and living your own story will lead to a life of fulfillment and satisfaction.
Do what makes your soul happy by choosing to embrace your gifts and talents. By doing so, you are saying yes to you and listening to your soul. Saying yes to you leads to a happier soul!
#7. Appreciate the Simple Beauty In Life
Take a look back at your “Things that make me happy” list. How many of the things that make you happy are things found in nature? Does your list have a lot of material things? How many are things that you need to spend money on?
It is natural to want to be loved and feel like we belong. Because of this, we buy things we don’t need and say “yes” to things we don’t want to do. We do this to feel a sense of love and belonging in our lives.
To do what makes your soul happy, try to focus on simple and beautiful things that bring out your happiness from within. It always feels good to make a purchase, but the happiness that comes with spending money is fleeting and doesn’t always last. This leaves us wanting more and spending more. It ends up being a cycle that continues without end.
To do what makes your soul happy, take the time to slow down and appreciate the beauty in life. It has become so normal to fill our lives with so many responsibilities that we struggle to appreciate the simple things.


One thing that makes me happy is taking a moment to stop and appreciate the weather. Where we live, every season brings its own unique and beautiful weather. In the winter, we enjoy a hot chocolate and watch big, fluffy snowflakes fall to the ground. In the fall, our family takes a walk through the park to enjoy the vibrant colors, cool weather, and the falling leaves.
These are examples of simple beauty in nature that is easy to miss if you aren’t looking for it. Slowing down and appreciating this beauty is one way to do what makes your soul happy.
#8. Take Care of Yourself
In order to do what makes your soul happy, you need to take care of yourself. It is easy to push taking care of yourself to the side while trying to manage all of the other responsibilities you have. However, doing so can be detrimental to your overall health and your soul. How are you supposed to do what makes your soul happy if you are not taking care of yourself?
Consider the following simple tips for how you can take better care of yourself:
- practice self-love
- get more sleep
- make healthy eating choices
- practice self-care
- move your body every day
- consider setting boundaries in your relationships that are not allowing you to do what makes your soul happy
- find your “one thing that makes me happy” and do it every day
- journal
- express gratitude
- get outside and enjoy nature


#9. Do What Makes Your Soul Happy By Following Your Heart
It is so easy to do what you think you’re supposed to do, or do what others want you to do. It’s easy to pretend that you don’t have a burning passion in your heart to reach some big crazy audacious goal.
Perhaps you’ve pushed your goals so far away from yourself that you don’t even know what they are anymore. The easy life is the one where we choose not to follow our hearts and shush the voice within us that tells us that we can do amazing things. But we get one chance in this life, and for that reason alone you should do what makes your soul happy.


If you aren’t a vision board person, become one! Make yourself a vision board and include all of the crazy dreams that you have always wanted in your life. Include so many vision board quotes that you can feel your dreams jumping out at you every time you look at your vision board.
Remember the “Things That Make Me Happy List”? Use that list as inspiration to get your creative juices flowing for your vision board. Do what makes your soul happy – follow your heart. You can do amazing things in this life, don’t let anyone (especially yourself) tell you otherwise.
#10. Be Present In All That You Do
In a world filled with technology and distractions, it’s so easy to spend most of your day disconnected from people and connected to your phone, computer, or some other form of technology. It has become harder and harder to disconnect from work, technology, and other distractions to be truly present in what we are doing.
Remember, being present is a choice, and it’s your choice! You can choose whether or not you show up for a task or for your family. You can choose whether you bring your phone to the dinner table, or whether you leave it in your room on the charger when you get home from work.
We all make choices in life (some good and others not so good). Make the choice to be present in your life rather than letting it pass you by. Do what makes your soul happy, be present, and show up for those around you.
#11. Make Value-Centric Choices
In order to do what makes your soul happy, you need to make value-centric choices. Your values are the beliefs you hold that align with what your soul wants for you in life.
Your goals in life will establish your priorities. If you are making choices that do not line up with you values, then you are going to struggle keeping your soul happy.
For example, imagine that you wanted to be a millionaire so that you could have tons of money and buy lots of stuff. Unless you hold money as a value, this would not be a value-centric goal.
Instead, perhaps you value family and time with your loved ones. Deciding to put a plan into place so that you can quit your job to spend more time with your family would be a value-centric goal. Not only are you more likely to accomplish goals that are value-centric, but you are also doing what makes your soul happy by pursuing a value-driven goal.
Your Soul, Your Happiness
We are all born with our own souls. Each of our souls has its own needs. You are the only one who can get in touch with yours to find ways to do what makes your soul happy. However, in general, the ideas described here will get you started as you work to connect with yourself and what makes your soul happy.
In order to do what makes your soul happy, you need to believe that you are worthy of letting your light shine. Don’t let the pressures of the world dim your light. Listen to what your soul needs and work hard to find lasting happiness for it!
Don’t forget to share this post with your friends and family on social media! If you know someone who could use some help with making their soul happy, this could be what they need to find joy inside!